Entertainment

Numbers: Skype Reports $126M Revenue, 33M New Subscribers in Q1

eBay has just released its latest earnings report, the highlight of which for most of our audience is probably the quarterly peak at how Skype, the company’s much maligned acquisition, is performing. From the announcement:

"Skype continued its strong growth trajectory, reporting $126 million in revenue for the quarter, representing 61% year-over-year growth. Skype added 33 million registered users in the quarter, ending the period with more than 309 million registered users around the world. Skype now has the largest registered user base within eBay Inc.’s portfolio of businesses."

While Skype might not be a good fit for eBay, those are impressive numbers by any measuring stick, and if eBay were to spin of Skype as its own public company, I think it would both appease eBay’s shareholders, put a bunch of cash in the bank for more sensible acquisitions, and also be one of the hotter Internet IPOs in years.

Few companies of Skype’s size can grow revenue and users more than 10% sequentially (quarter-over-quarter), which would make it a very attractive company to Wall Street investor types. Perhaps eBay has hung onto Skype this long just to let it grow into its $4 billion valuation before offering it up on the public markets or selling to someone else? eBay certainly doesn’t seem to be in any hurry, and Skype seems to just keep growing rapidly in spite of itself.

Mashable
is a global, multi-platform media and entertainment company. Powered by its own proprietary technology, Mashable is the go-to source for tech, digital culture and entertainment content for its dedicated and influential audience around the globe.